


second chance (i shouldn't waste it) but it's my past (and i can't face it)

by satanindisguise



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Anakin is done with life, Haters can meet me in the pit, Suicide, The Author Regrets Nothing, This was meant to be sad, Time Travel, if this randomly updates it's just me messing with the tags
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 08:53:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29293212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/satanindisguise/pseuds/satanindisguise
Summary: Anakin died. Trouble is, he didn't stay dead. Waking up, he's given a second chance at life, one that he sure as hell doesn't deserve.Unfortunately for his second chance, Anakin doesn't fancy staying alive any longer.
Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker (implied), Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 10
Kudos: 79





	second chance (i shouldn't waste it) but it's my past (and i can't face it)

Anakin floats in darkness for what feels like a long time, but he can’t be sure. Not that time matters to him. He’s dead, and time is a concept for the living. He can’t remember much as he drifts along, conscious but...not really. His first awareness comes when he feels like something had punched his very soul, and he wakes up. 

  


On a  _ bed.  _

  


He lies still for a minute. He had  _ died,  _ he’s absolutely sure of it. Luke had been  _ right there _ , a blurry form in Anakin’s ruined vision but there all the same. Anakin grits his teeth, wondering if his son had gone against his wishes and taken him to get healing, but a knock somewhere nearby startles him enough that the bitter thoughts are cut off. 

  


“–akin? Anakin! Force’s sake, are you still in bed!?” The voice is muffled behind a door, but Anakin would know it anywhere. 

  


_ Obi-Wan.  _

  


His heart clenches painfully and he sits up, blinking against light as a blanket falls away from where it had been pulled over his head. He’s...in his old bedroom, the one in the Jedi Temple. Light streams through the window, and Anakin can  _ breathe.  _ Then, reality hits him and the air is knocked from his lungs. He feels the panic begin to settle, untethered, before Obi-Wan’s voice comes through the door again.

  


“Anakin? Are you alright?” concern and warmth laces the older– younger? He sounds like he did when he was in his thirties...– man’s voice, and Anakin can feel it through the Force. “I’m not mad that you slept in, but you  _ are  _ the one who jumped at the chance to guard Senator Amidala. I’d expect you go be up.” 

  


“I-” Anakin cuts off, freezing at the sound of his voice. Not Vader’s voice, the one that came from his armour, and not the meek whisper that it had been reduced to outside of the suit, but  _ his  _ voice. His eyes burn. He can’t remember the last time they did that. “Obi-Wan?” 

  


“Yes, dear one?” 

  


Anakin can’t help but choke back his emotions, shutting his mental shields tightly at the waves of grief that crash over him. He can’t be– he can’t be  _ back,  _ can he? Before everything? The affection in that name...could this be his punishment? Reliving the years where he wasn’t a slave to Sidious, where he was loved? He bites down on his hand  _ hard  _ to stop the sob that threatens to leave him. Anakin hadn’t cried in over a decade and he wasn’t about to start again now. 

  


There’s a sigh from outside the door, Obi-Wan’s concern lacing the bond between them. “If something’s wrong, you can tell me, Anakin,” he says, voice unbearably soft, “I’ll let them know we’re getting a bit of a late start. Do try to hurry, though, would-be assassins don’t tend to wait.” 

  


He waits until Obi-Wan’s footsteps fade. When he’s well and truly sure that the man is gone, Anakin slides out of bed and sits on the floor. Staring at his hands, Anakin lets out a shaky breath at the sight of flesh. His hands hadn’t been flesh in a long, long time, and being able to  _ feel  _ them causes him to shudder. Swallowing, he pinches his arm. There’s a burst of pain and it cements in his situation as reality. 

  


Anakin wants to scream. 

  


All the pain, all the hurt, all the destruction, and he’s the one who was sent back? Why not Obi-Wan? Hell, even  _ Yoda!  _ Either of them could do so much good for everybody. Anakin...couldn’t. When had he ever done something good? 

  


Every time he tried, it came back to bite him. 

  


He shuts his eyes. In the darkness, he sees their faces, clear as day. The younglings, the Jedi, the rebels, Padmé,  _ Obi-Wan.  _ Could he save them? With this second chance, could he give them all a happy ending? 

  


He could. He could get rid of Palpatine, clear out all of his former enemies before they got a chance to rise up. Anakin is skilled enough in the force and has enough experience under his belt to do it. Not effortlessly, of course, he doesn’t underestimate his enemies like that, but he’d manage it. 

  


More than that, though, Anakin wants to  _ rest _ . It’s selfish of him, he knows that. He has this chance to change things but all he thinks about is himself and what  _ he  _ wants. Then again, when has he ever done anything differently?

  


It doesn’t take long for him to make up his mind and when he does, Anakin slowly stands. His lightsaber– his first one, blue and so firmly in the light that it’s hard to think he had ever wielded it– rests beside the bed. Holding it in his hand, he takes a moment to appreciate the weight, how it fits perfectly in his grip. This lightsaber had been built by him and for him, and Anakin regrets that he had ever lost it. 

_   
_

_ “This lightsaber is your life,”  _ Obi-Wan had told him once. Recalling, Anakin lets out a tired, broken laugh. He rests the lightsaber against his chest, the open end pointed up towards his heart. 

  


There’s no space. No room for error. Taking a short moment to regret all that he wouldn’t do, Anakin activates it. 

  


Once and for all, he becomes one with the force. 

  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Was the obikin implication completely and utterly unnecessary? Maybe, but I'm trash and it's my fanfiction so I do what I want. Haters can stay mad about it. 
> 
> Might fuck around and continue this as a "the Force won't let Anakin die so he's obligated to save the galaxy or else be stuck in an infinite loop of resurrection" fic. Lemme know what y'all think and I might get around to it.


End file.
